PARIS (ABC4) — United States Olympic Committee President Sarah Hirshland called it “THE difference maker” in Salt Lake City landing the 2034 Winter Olympic Games: sustainability.
Everyone seems to recognize that the way Salt Lake City and Park City have maintained all the venues used in the 2002 Winter Games was a major key to landing the 2034 Games. But on Wednesday morning, Hirshland outright confirmed it was the biggest key.
“Keep in mind from where I sit, I have 205 peers around the world,” Hirshland told ABC4.com. “Many of those countries dream and aspire to host the Games, let alone have a place like Salt Lake City do it twice.”
Hirshland said few areas in the world have the “luxury of geography and what Mother Nature has given to Utah,” but even fewer are also able to add the political and public support for hosting such an event.
But on top of that, Hirshland said Utah had other advantages, such as having strong collegiate partners who support winter sports. She praised the University of Utah — which will host a number of 2034’s events and the Athlete Village. 2034 will also bring a new twist to hosting athletes: hosting their families.
Hirshland said Olympic ski champion Lindsay Vonn — a 2002 Games alum — was the driving person behind establishing housing for athletes’ families for Salt Lake’s next Games. It will be the first time a host city will make specific space for the families of those competing in the Games.
“When you listen to athletes, they know what matters,” said Hirshland. “And they know what their experience is. This is a classic case of Lindsay saying, ‘I know where my challengers were. It’s navigating a lot of things and bringing the people who got me there along with me.”
That’s a major shift to pull off in what could possibly be one of the most important decades for American sports on the world stage. In 2028, Los Angeles will host its second Summer Olympic Games. Six years after that, Salt Lake will host their second Games. Hirshland said two major events in a 10-year span adds “complexity” to both.
Hirshland is also carefully choosing her words after International Olympic Committee members held up Salt Lake’s final vote by over a half hour on Wednesday expressing concerns over whether Americans would support the Olympics’ chosen anti-doping body. The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) came under fire after some felt the organization has double standards on which countries face sanctions for doping controversies.
Hirshland said anti-doping is very important in the Olympic world, but it is also very volatile. She pointed out that WADA has to deal with over 200 anti-doping organizations in each of the Olympic member countries. As such, things can get “messy.” Ultimately, she said all the organizations need to work together to support clean sports.
“We have to unify our efforts and talk about how to solve problems instead of throwing bottles over the bow, so to speak,” she said.
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